Cannes for me is an exercise in chasing big-money movie deals, but I took the opportunity to meet several French companies to get a view of the business from their side of the pond. Compared to the problems I hear from Hollywood, these guys struggle for growth in a French theatrical system that seems completely preposterous to an Americain.

In Hollywood, they whine about how hard it is to get a movie made; about a weekend crowded with three new releases; the inefficiency of big P&A spends to advertise on TV to ensure moviegoers show up opening weekend; and the six-month wait for DVD and VOD. In France, a heavily subsidized system makes getting movies made the easy part. The downside: 15-18 films open week in and week out; TV advertising is outlawed, and the wait for DVD and VOD is an eternity compared to the U.S. Small wonder several of the major French companies are looking outside elsewhere for growth.

For a company like Gaumont, that means supplementing Centrée Français fare by hatching U.S. market TV hits like Hannibal. Wild Bunch’s core business is backing gutsy films like Blue Is The Warmest Color, but at this Cannes, the company created a stir showing a film before its precedent-setting straight-to-VOD release. Welcome To New York is Abel Ferrara’s lurid drama that stars Gerard Depardieu as a crass, horny money man based on former IMF head Dominique Strauss-Kahn, who cut a decadent swath around the world before being arrested for allegedly mauling a maid in a New York hotel. Because Wild Bunch bypassed theaters, it could spend $1 million on TV ads, creating more awareness than if it had gone theatrical and could not advertise. Success will mean more films with bigger stars test this new market and that could be as disruptive to France’s arcane theatrical machine as the current crop of pay and cable TV series like True Detective feel compared to the derivative product churned out by Hollywood movie studios.

The biggest gamble by a French company here is the aggressive expansion into Hollywood by EuropaCorp partners Luc Besson and Christophe Lambert. They’ve got two films at Cannes: the French-language Bertrand Bonello-directed Saint Laurent, acquired by Sony Pictures Classics, and tonight’s premiere of the Tommy Lee Jones-directed Western The Homesman. More important for the future, Lambert on Friday unveiled a new five-year, $450 million JPMorgan-led credit facility that will fund production and P&A for a slate of eight English-language commercial films released through Red, the pipeline that EuropaCorp bought 50% of from Relativity. They hired a very capable development exec in Lisa Ellzey, and by the start of Toronto, will have a seasoned acquisitions exec in place to bolster the homegrown slate with two to four films per year. The distrib company gets underway with a reboot of the Besson-created Transporter franchise, and Lambert said they expect to have as many as seven films in production by year’s end. While the Besson-directed Lucy will be released by Universal, Besson will from now on direct a movie each year to be released through Red.

Everybody comes to Cannes selling a strategy they say makes them special. Rarely is the pitch as ambitious as the EuropaCorp plan, and they seem to have constructed a pretty good mousetrap. The money is solid, and Lambert said buying a release pipeline gives he and Besson complete control over their U.S. release, key to triggering global deals with the output partners Lambert said covers 80% of the risk on each film they make. The trump card, similar to companies like DreamWorks, Imagine and Bad Robot, is an in-house A-list director who can be a creative godfather. EuropaCorp’s ace card has always been the prolific imagination of Besson and that will be crucial going forward; besides the annual film he’ll direct, Besson will generate the ideas for as many as five other projects on the slate each year.

“When we started, we had no money,” Lambert told me as we had coffee with Ellzey at the Majestic right after he and JPMorgan banker David Shaheen introduced what they called the largest amount of capital raised by an offshore company in the U.S. “We could not buy any expensive book or remake rights. The only free material was our own ideas and imagination, and that became the foundation of a company that produced 145 films in 10 years. Being a creative driven company became our biggest asset. Luc’s initial dream when he founded the company was to build the first non-U.S. major,” Lambert said. “We are not there yet, but we now have everything we need; the projects, talented people working with us, distribution capability and now, money. So, it’s up to us. If we fail, it will be because of us.”

I mention to them that people say if you shake Steven Spielberg, chances are a couple good movie ideas will tumble out. Besson is similar.

“Luc will go on vacation for two weeks, and he always comes back with a fully written script,” Lambert told me. “He writes every morning from 5 AM until noon, longer when he’s on vacation. Sometimes I will say, Luc, go on vacation, we need a script.” Besson grew up the son of diving instructors, and spends part of those vacations exercising his other love, diving. He would have been a competitive deep water diver were it not some pressure issues in his ears, a condition that led him to make The Big Blue and become a director. The filmmaker prefers to do his diving in the Bahamas when he vacations. You might soon seem him in the Pacific, because both he and Lambert are moving their families to Los Angeles in June to prepare for EuropaCorp 2.0.

“It is crucial for us to be there,” Lambert said. “We would never be able to achieve our plan without it. You need to be there to meet people, to take a coffee with an actor, meet a writer, that is the way the business is done. We were producing three big movies a year from Paris, and before we had Lisa in LA, the time difference meant starting our workdays at midnight, so we could talk to writers there. It was crazy. I have my projects, Luc has his, and we felt we had to be available.”

The stepped-up output will mean farming Besson’s ideas out to other writers.

“Luc wrote Lucy alone, but he doesn’t have time for them all,” Lambert said. “So he comes with ideas and concepts, we discuss and decide which to forward with, and then Lisa matches the project to the right writer.”

Said Ellzey: “I put him in the room with some writers, he pitches a very detailed idea of the movie he has running in his head. The writer processes it, absorbs it, comes back, and then, as Luc describes it, they play. It’s a really intense creative session, and you have to bring it, and be able to play with him.”

Attempts to change established protocol in France by EuropaCorp or Wild Bunch for that matter, has the potential to create conflict. At the Cannes press conference, Lambert defended himself when French journalists decried the loss of a major generator of French fare, and they lamented the loss of French dialogue in movies. Lambert was quick to note EuropaCorp would still make four French movies per year like Saint Laurent, but the more important consideration was they would still be infusing the French movie economy with money, since virtually all of these movies will be shot at EuropaCorp’s studio in France.

“In France, they always make the same mistake and say that it’s about protecting the language,” Lambert told me. “The language is the language and it doesn’t need protection. The only thing that really matters is that the industry here continues to have some chops, and that is hard to do when you see 250 French movies released a year. Add that to the best 200 American films, and that’s almost 500 movies a year, with no access to do TV ads to promote them. That’s why only 20-25 of them achieve more than one million admissions per year. We will spend the money here at our studios and create jobs, and that is what is important. The value proposition of our company relies on our ability to produce for less money than U.S. productions. We’ll do that by exerting control over our U.S. releases that trigger our output deals, while benefiting from the French subsidies we qualify for by shooting the films here.”

Came across this nifty guide to Do-It-Yourself Digital Distribution Platforms which breaks down how much of a cut filmmakers receive from streaming or download revenues when their movies sell online. It doesn't include services such as Netflix, Vodo, Indieflix, Indiepix and others that require approval though.

kinda scrolled this tbh, but i think it's saying that in an unprecedented hollywood move several people with lots of money, including ron fucking howard, are going to give children money for being wonderful beautiful magical creatures

Fandor Aims to Help Filmmakers and Film Festivals With New Initiativesvia Indiewire

Since joining Fandor earlier this year as its CEO, veteran film producer Ted Hope has expressed ambitious goals for the subscription streaming service and film community. Today the company announced plans to expand the online service with two new initiatives intended to help filmmakers, audiences and festivals.

The two programs are The Fandor|Festival Alliance (F|FA), which will use Fandor’s existing assets and technology to help film festivals; and FIX, an initiative designed to help filmmakers showcase their existing work on Fandor while engaging with their audiences.

"Fandor is clearly a community, facilitated by our constantly evolving platform and service," said Fandor CEO Ted Hope in a statement. "Like the best filmmakers and most inquisitive audience members, we are never satisfied with the existing state of things and are always looking to improve the experience of our members, as well as the film community at large. These new initiatives indicate our dedication to being the community’s conversation starter."

FIX will enable filmmakers to feature both their current work, as well as upcoming projects, through new, dynamic webpages at Fandor.com that facilitate interaction between filmmakers and their audiences.

“FIX is reflection of the unique direct relationships we have with many of the remarkable filmmakers available on the service,” said Jonathan Marlow, Fandor co-founder and Chief Content Officer. “We have always wanted to enhance the network effect of gathering great films and great filmmakers in one place. FIX allows us an ideal opportunity for connecting artists with audiences.

FIX launches with 5 filmmakers all debuting new work on Fandor, nearly 30 premieres in total. The featured filmmakers include: Caroline Martel ("Wavemakers"), Hal Hartley ("The Girl from Monday," "Ambition and Theory of Achievement"), Barry Jenkins ("My Josephine" and "Little Brown Boy"), Marie Losier ("The Ballad of Genesis" and "Lady Jaye") and Mark Rappaport ("Casual Relations" and "Postcards.") In addition to these first 5 featured filmmakers, roughly 100 other filmmakers (such as Janie Geiser and Nathan and David Zellner) are also a part of FIX.

The Fandor | Festival Alliance will serve as a technical partner, offering solutions to many of the technology challenges shared by film festivals on both a short and long term basis. At launch, Fandor will spotlight dynamic film festival pages for F|FA partners, offer structured membership incentive packages and provide national promotions for partners through advertising and social reach.

Partners to date include: Camden International Film Festival/ME, Full Frame Documentary Film Festival/NC, Global Peace Film Festival/FL, Independent Film Festival Boston/MA, IFP Festival Forum/NY, Lone Star Film Festival/TX, Indie Memphis Film Festival/TN, Nantucket Film Festival/MA, Napa Valley Film Festival/CA, New Orleans Film Festival/LA, Oakcliff Film Festival/TX, San Francisco Jewish Film Festival/CA, San Francisco Silent Film Festival/CA, Santa Fe Film Festival/NM, and with more to come.

How Fandor's 'Filmmaker's Initiative' Will Help You Get Your Films Madevia nofilmschool

Fandor, the curated online distribution platform known for featuring indie shorts, features, and docs, announced the Filmmaker's Initiative (FIX) over the summer, and now they are kicking into high gear, and putting their money with their mouth is.

Working with filmmakers like Hal Hartley and Dario Argento, as well as lesser-known indie talents, FIX is, among other things, contributing to member filmmaker's crowdfunding campaigns. According to Fandor's Amanda Salazar, FIX is Fandor's attempt to build a "community of filmmakers," as well as "connect filmmakers and audiences in a meaningful way," so that the site isn't just a place for films to "sit and get clicked on."

The aim, according to Fandor, is for a filmmaker to have a place where all of their work can be displayed, like this page for legendary documentarian Al Maysles, as well as a resource for funding their new work. Fandor is working with its filmmakers' crowdsourcing campaigns, contributing a month's membership at the site for every $5 donated to a FIX filmmaker's project.

Right now, some of the FIX filmmakers with projects in development include Matt McCormick, horror legend Dario Argento, and filmmaker Gleb Osatinski, whose Kickstarter campaign for his sci-fi short, The Quantified Self, ends this week.

And how does a filmmaker get involved with FIX? Easy, says Salazar. Just submit a film to Fandor. If selected for the site, the filmmaker will automatically become a member of FIX. This "different approach to online distribution" aims to help "develop filmmakers," and if you're a filmmaker looking for a home for your work, as well as a platform to help raise money for your new projects, FIX might be worth checking out. Time will tell if this novel approach to online distribution and funding changes the existing paradigm of internet distribution, but so far, results have been good: FIX filmmaker Penny Lane's new work overshot its Kickstarter goal just last week

The latest Nightcrawler trailer features a clickable link to buy tickets right at the end. This would help so much if applied to indie films that are hard to find in the first place. Only worrying thing is that it's tied to a specific ticket vendor but (shrug). Hope this gets implemented more.

Indiegogo and Vimeo are joining forces with the latter to serve as the preferred distribution platform for the film funding site. In addition, Vimeo has also committed to a film fund for select Indiegogo feature campaigns in exchange for exclusive distribution on Vimeo On Demand.

Additionally, there will be a dedicated Vimeo VOD storefront on Indiegogo’s site with titles funded by their crowdfunding campaigns available for purchase. Vimeo will also feature a dedicated Indiegogo VOD home on Vimeo featuring a rotating lineup of Indiegogo-funded films curated by Vimeo. Film campaigners who opt to release their films on Vimeo On Demand will be able to access benefits not offered by other crowdfunding sites: free fulfillment on all digital download perks, a discounted Vimeo PRO account, and inclusion in a featured “Indiegogo Funded Films” collection on Vimeo, which reaches over 170 million global users a month.

“Indiegogo is leading the way for next generation filmmaking,” said Slava Rubin, CEO of Indiegogo in a statement. “Mirroring the diversity of our open platform, we are proud to support an incredibly robust community of filmmakers across multiple genres. With the addition of Vimeo as a distribution partner, it is now easier than ever for filmmakers using Indiegogo, to pursue their passions, receive funding, garner global exposure, and deliver their work directly to their fans.”

“Vimeo is all about giving power to the creators,” added Kerry Trainor, CEO, Vimeo. “This partnership highlights both Vimeo and Indiegogo’s continued support of independent filmmakers on a global level, and provides Indiegogo’s community of creators an opportunity to be exposed to an even wider audience via Vimeo’s transactional VOD platform.”

The first feature that’s part of the Indiegogo-Vimeo partnership is Malcom Carter’s documentary The Connected Universe on the interconnectivity of all things, featuring the work of theorist Nassim Haramein. The film is Indiegogo’s highest funded documentary in the company’s history. Past Indiegogo campaigns that have used Vimeo as their distribution method include Video Game High School Season Three, Angry Video Game Nerd: The Movie and Mad As Hell, which will be available next month on Vimeo.

Streaming Service Fandor Launches 5-Film Development Initiative on Kickstartervia Indiewire

With the launch of FIXShorts, the curated subscription streaming service continues to find new avenues for filmmakers and cinephiles to engage in the digital realm. Today, the company announced the launch of FIXShorts, a program designed to develop five independent film projects from funding to distribution. As part of the initiative, Fandor will contribute 50% of each project's budget up front, provide the rewards for Kickstarter campaigns to fund the other 50% of production costs, and guarantee distribution on its platform.

The news comes two months after interim CEO Chris Kelly, pictured above, replaced former CEO Ted Hope, who moved on to Amazon Studios after one year at Fandor. The company continues to forge connections with others in what Kelly has called "the film ecosystem," including its excellent film journal, Keyframe, and existing partnerships with Hulu and The Criterion Collection. In addition, Fandor has received much-deserved attention for an artful catalogue of titles, such as Bruno Dumont's acclaimed "Li'l Quinquin," which enjoyed a day-and-date SVOD release on the platform in January. Programs such as FIXShorts are just another element in Fandor's multi-pronged audience-building strategy.

Upon their completion, the five films in the FIXShorts initiative will premiere on Fandor in tandem with their respective film festival premieres, with rights to each film remaining with the filmmakers. The five projects, with brief synopses, are listed below:

"Anyuka," Maya Erdelyi (animated documentary)An animated documentary on the life of the filmmaker’s grandmother and her journey to America.

"Dead Ink Archive," David Schendel (narrative)Set in 1975, a janitor has a secret that he cannot share until he collects all of the discarded scraps of paper from a theatre floor.

"Discontinuity," Lori Felker (narrative)A couple have been separated from each other for many months and they do not know what they’ve been missing.

"He Who Eats Children," Ben Russell (documentary)A speculative portrait of a Dutch hermit living in the Surinamese jungle.

"Sea to Shining Sea," Maximon Monihan (narrative)Two friends drive across the country from California to New York, finally experiencing the glory of the USA.

First, a quick primer for those not familiar with how film financing happens in many territories outside the United States. In Canada, the U.K., and many European and Latin American countries, there are handfuls of government subsidized funding bodies that providing financing to locally produced films and television shows. The money comes from a variety of sources, including taxes or monies paid by broadcasters who operate in the country. The idea is that this financing helps foster continued creative and cultural growth, and helps balance the scales somewhat against the influx of Hollywood products. This system has certainly supported numerous auteurs around the world, but what is the responsibility of VOD players to support the system, seeing as how they don't technically reside in any one country?

That was the crux of the barbed question Netflix honcho Ted Sarandos faced today at the tail end of his talk at the Cannes Film Festival. A French journalist pointed out that Netflix is based out of the Netherlands in Europe, they don't have to contribute to the same subsidies as other VOD players and broadcasters, and then moreover speculated that Netflix's unwillingness to play ball would lead to the destruction of film culture in Europe.

Sarandos countered that Netflix certainly wasn't taking away any existing funding for filmmakers, and by hiring local talent for their own original programming, they were actually being quite supportive of filmmaking in Europe. But not one to let his voice go unheard, Harvey Weinstein was in attendance and jumped up to the defense of Netflix (who distributed his "Marco Polo" series and are working on the "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" sequel).

“This is a guy who buys documentaries and cares. This is a guy who buys foreign-language movies and cares," Weinstein said. "And every one of these monopolies, let’s start with [French broadcaster] TF1…they’ve gotten a wake-up call by what Netflix has done. And you know what? They’ve all gotten better and their quality is going to improve and they’re going to be big customers for your product. So, having the rebel in the room made us all better and stronger.”

FLEMING: We broke a story this week that I predict will further dissolve the barriers between TV and feature films. Brad Pitt sets his next star vehicle at Netflix. It’s different from past Netflix deals like the Crouching Tiger “sequel” or a four-pack of Adam Sandler comedies, because who knows what the theatrical release value of either of those really is. We know Pitt is one of the few globally bankable stars who matter anymore. Also an enterprising producer, he realistically assessed the risky commercial prospects of a prestige passion project, and bypassed the enormous P&A and foreign sales and uncertain theatrical penetration for a slam dunk at Netflix. Ted Sarandos and Reed Hastings are busting down doors all over the world and will be in more countries by the time this film rolls out in late 2016. And they were only too happy to pay a premium for a game changing coup. And so a potentially huge global audience of Netflix subscribers will see the David Michod-directed War Machine, with Pitt playing a character modeled on General Stanley McChrystal, who ran the war in Afghanistan until undermined by politics, and some indiscreet quotes in a Rolling Stone article. This turns the traditional theatrical feature model on its ear and creates an alternative to what often proves to be an incredibly costly and inefficient strategy; who not bring movies directly to an audience satisfied to stay home and watch it on the 60 inch TV screen.

BART: Don’t knock the ‘inefficient strategy so aggressively–it’s still the strategy that has kept Hollywood purring for generations. Still, Pitt’s venture should be studied by every star. The ever increasing obsession of studios on tentpole picture has sharply reduced the opportunities for top actors to find a challenging role (unless they like ants). The situation is vaguely reminiscent of that moment in the 40s and ‘50s when the studios abruptly terminated their contracts with top stars. Suddenly every actor was desperately trying to develop his own films – a very few, like Kirk Douglas and Burt Lancaster showed any talent at it. Today, the big stars find that new platforms are beckoning and need to find ways to access them. Since agents look upon their stars as “brands,” perhaps they should follow the lead of the top fashion brands that pursue down-market labels. Think of Valentino, Armani, Missoni and Ralph Lauren. Why shouldn’t Clooney have a Clooney Red (like Valentino)or Di Caprio a Di Caprio Exchange(like Armani)? Liberated from the pressure of finding a decent part in a superhero movie (Downey is a very lucky man), they might come up with some fascinating projects for Netflix or Amazon or some sharp-edged short form pieces for other platforms – think mobile! I don’t yearn to see any more Adam Sandler movies, but he could still be likeable in six minute chunks on my smart phone.

FLEMING: Here is what I like about this. Had that Entourage movie been made for and shown on HBO, it would have cost less money, and it would have created enough of a ratings bang to have birthed an annual visit with Ari Gold and the boys. It would have been a win. Instead, its $25 million domestic gross (and miniscule overseas tally) puts it in the summer casualty column because these niche movies just cost too much money to launch to the mass market. Netflix got its TV game changer with House of Cards (Kevin Spacey is a guy who has shown the flexibility to gamble on platform disruptive projects, including Margin Call), and he needed one big movie star to take a gamble, and now he got it and it will open the door to all kinds of things. When I saw Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson peel the layers on complicated characters over the course of 8 or so hours in True Detective, I felt the ground shifting. I love mystery novel series, but you never see them turned into movies. Michael Connelly battled in court for years to get back his Harry Bosch novels that languished forever at Paramount, and then Amazon Studios turned it into the streaming service equivalent of a page-turner novel with Titus Welliver playing Bosch.

I would love to see Netflix revive Robert B Parker’s Spenser For Hire series with a great actor like Kyle Chandler playing the boxer-turned-gumshoe, serving up a new mystery every year. The possibilities here for quality are enormous. You can never replicate the shared theater going experience on something like Jurassic World, (which will hit break-even in days, Universal’s fourth film this year to recoup within 30 days of release) and even certain smaller movies where you shut out the world for a couple hours. It can be a great business that pours off cash at an astonishing rate. But until movie makers and exhibitors figure it out with windowing and find a way around the spectacularly inefficient manner in which marginal movies are marketed, I’d call War Machine constructive progress. I caught up with John Ridley at our Awardsline Emmy party last week. Hadn’t seen him in forever, but we kind of grew up together, me covering him when he was struggling and his Three Kings script got taken away and refashioned into a memorable movie by David O Russell and his book Stray Dogs got overhauled by Oliver Stone into U-Turn. Ridley has since won the Oscar for 12 Years A Slave and spends much of his time on the series American Crime. He said he loves movies but relishes the authorship given a TV creator/show runner that isn’t part of feature films. We both agreed this whole golden era of series occurred because Hollywood stopped making edgy mid budget films, forcing guys like Ridley to the small screen so they could feed their families. Pitt/Netflix is another iteration of a creative business adapting and finding a way for quality to rise. Some lessons will never be learned–how is it they’ve made four Jurassic Park movies and still go into each one not realizing a dinosaur theme park is a bad idea?–but Hollywood is evolving fast and Netflix is forcing the issue. My question is how much longer the Academy will require award season “qualifying theatrical runs” for Oscar consideration, which means you show it in a theater in New York and Los Angeles. Netflix will provide that for War Machine, but it is beginning to seem silly and meaningless, since it’s not how this project will be consumed globally.

BART: Let’s not get carried away, Mike. A theatrical release is still a smart and reasonable mandate. There are elements of the Academy process that don’t make sense any more — an example is the requirement that documentaries need a New York Times review to qualify for Oscar nomination. But leave the movie stuff alone.

FLEMING: My question is how much longer the Academy will require award season “qualifying theatrical runs” for Oscar consideration, which means you show it in a theater in New York and Los Angeles. Netflix will provide that for War Machine, but it is beginning to seem silly and meaningless, since it’s not how this project will be consumed globally.

BART: Let’s not get carried away, Mike. A theatrical release is still a smart and reasonable mandate. There are elements of the Academy process that don’t make sense any more — an example is the requirement that documentaries need a New York Times review to qualify for Oscar nomination. But leave the movie stuff alone.

It's a good point though. Obviously it's something that's still a few years away, but it will have to be addressed eventually. Especially if theatrical releases increasingly become financially viable for only the biggest blockbusters. Unless they adapt, there will come a time when all nominees will be The Dark Knights by default.